More, Stronger Hurricanes Likely With La Nina's Return

Climate experts Thursday confirmed the start of La Nina — a mild cooling of the tropical Pacific Ocean that often coincides with stronger and more numerous hurricanes, a wetter Pacific Northwest and a drier South.

The center confirmed jet stream changes and lower-than-normal water temperatures in parts of the Pacific Ocean in the past three months, O'Lenic said at a meeting of the American Meteorological Society in Atlanta.

O'Lenic said that while it is too early to predict the ultimate effects of this year's La Nina — the agency has only about 50 years of data on La Nina occurrences — he expects more strong hurricane activity in the Atlantic.

Hurricane-friendly conditions are expected "for quite a while, a decade or more," he said.